Wordpress 3.0 Unleashed

Finally, the much awaited WordPress 3.0 had been released and made available to the public. I was expecting it to be just weeks away after Thesis 1.7 had been released but the long waiting game is now over. WordPress users are excited to see the new default theme, Twenty Ten.

Aside from the new default theme, WordPress 3.0 offers more features and updates that greatly improves user experience and site management. So, instead of having to explain everything, here’s a complete list of what’s news with WordPress 3.0.

WordPress and WordPress MU have merged, allowing the management of multiple sites (called Multisite) from one WordPress installation.
New default theme “Twenty Ten” takes full advantage of the current features of WordPress.
New custom menu management feature, allows creation of custom menus combining posts, pages, categories, tags, and links for use in theme menus or widgets.
Custom header and background APIs.
Contextual help text accessed under the Help tab of every screen in the WordPress administration.
Ability to set the admin username and password during installation.
Bulk updating of themes with an automatic maintenance mode during the process.
Support for shortlinks.
Improved Custom post types and custom taxonomies including hierarchical (category-style) support. (Try the Custom Post Type UI or GD Custom Posts And Taxonomies Tools plugins to see the possibilities.)
A lighter admin color scheme to increase accessibility and put the focus more squarely on your content.

User Features

General

Check required php and mysql versions in the update and notify if the server environment does not meet those requirements
New wp_login_form() provides a simple login form for use anywhere
New WordPress logo for admin header
Place “Search Engines Blocked” mini-alert in the wp-admin header to prevent people from accidentally delisting themselves
Remove ‘Turbo’ link from admin header and remove Turbo section from the Tools->Tools panel
Renamed various menu items, for example Posts->Edit becomes Posts->Posts, and Links->Edit becomes Links->Links, and so on
Revised administration menu icons
Revised Gray Admin Color Scheme
Revised information in readme.html file
Show login form upon email-sent for recover/reset passwords

Dashboard

Add link so user can visit Dashboard after core upgrade
Move Tools->Upgrade menu option to Dashboard->Updates and overhaul of user interface so themes, plugins, and core upgrades under one panel
New menu management (navigation) via Menus option under Appearances Menu (#11817)
Password nag for newly registered users
Split Right Now widget into Content | Discussion

Posts

Allow for removing all tags in quick edit
Allow themes to style the visual editor with editor-style.css file, using add_editor_style() function
Enable custom taxonomy UI for pages as well as for posts
Improved revision comparison user interface
Shortlinks enabled, but still requires a plugin or theme support to fully realize this feature
Added capital_P_dangit() filter to change ‘WordPress‘ to ‘WordPress‘.

Media

Add FunnyOrDie.com oEmbed support
Allow Deletion of Media Alt text
Change Media UI labels from “Post Thumbnails” to “Featured Image”
Cleanup of the edit media screen
Don’t let “Crunching” overlap image name while uploading
Optimize scan for lost attachments
Support for additional file type extensions (Changesets 12581 and 13349)

Links

Order link categories by name, not count, on Add New/Edit Link page

Comments

Add additional columns to the Posts Comments view
Allow configuration of number of comments to display Recent Comments dashboard module
Block comments for future posts and password protected posts (when password not provided)
Change to comments UI to show when a comment is replying to another, and link to the parent comment

Appearance

Add meta_value_num and meta_key ordering for WP_Query to allow natural numeric ordering of results
Add filter to get_avatar() to allow avatars for custom comment types
Allow Tab indenting, Shift-Tab (outdenting), and multi-line tabbing, in theme editor
Allow the Tag Cloud Widget to support non-tag taxonomies
Allow theme background customization via new Background panel under Appearance menu
New template file, front-page.php, for the front page of a site
New template file, single-{post_type}.php, for custom post types
New template files, author-{nicename}.php, and author-{id}.php, for author specific templates
New template files, taxonomy.php, taxonomy-{taxonomy}.php and taxonomy-{taxonomy}-{term}.php for custom taxonomies
Style tweaks to theme editor
Tab interface for Manage Themes and Install Themes in Appearance->Themes panel
Improved child theme support; child theme use is highly encouraged and as described in the Child Themes article, very simple to accomplish
New comment_form() that outputs a complete commenting form for use within a theme template
The Default (Kubrick), and Classic themes, are no longer included in the WordPress distribution, but are available in the Theme repository

Plugins

Add Details and Install Now action links under each plugin listed in Install Plugins
Allow Tab indenting, Shift-Tab (outdenting), and multi-line tabbing, in plugin editor
Upgrade plugins in bulk from the Plugins->Installed panel (#11542)
When deleting plugins, check for uninstall hooks, and warn of data deletion

Tools

Add tag-to-category and category-to-tag converters to the Tools panel, add tag-to-category converter links to Posts->Post Tags panel
Clean up OPML link export script
Expanded filter criteria in Administration > Tools > Export panel
Import WordPress fixes notices, attachments, and users
Removed Turbo menu item, but because Turbo files weren’t removed, Turbo may still work
All importers moved to the plugin repository (e.g. WordPress Importer)

Users

Allow “No role for this blog” to be chosen in Users->Add New panel

Settings

Removed Settings->Miscellaneous admin menu, moved uploads settings to Settings->Media panel
Revise Settings->General panel, change “Blog” reference to “Site”
Revise Gray Admin Color Scheme